


The Hero

by 11chance11



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Angst and Humor, Episode Related, Established Relationship, M/M, Medical Procedures, Organ Transplantation, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-16
Updated: 2016-05-16
Packaged: 2018-06-08 17:12:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6865579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/11chance11/pseuds/11chance11
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An addition to O Ke Ali'l Wale No Ka'u Makemake (My Only Desire is for the Chief)  6x25.  No changes to the sequence of events from the show, just my own McDanno version of the after events.  Not betaed, but hopefully proofed okay.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Hero

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all so much for reading my stories and for taking the time to leave your sweet comments and kudos. They have been so encouraging.

The Hero

Steve leaned his dark head over the forehead of his partner and bushed soft kisses across his warm skin. His arms gripped its precious cargo a little more firmly, but still without restricting him.

In the backdrop of their bedroom, the soft din of the hockey game that Danny had wanted to watch occasionally combined with the thoughts going through Steve's head. It was funny, but before he'd met Danny, Steve hadn't paid a whole of attention to the sport. Now, he knew all the rules, how to score, what every penalty and term meant and even had vested interests in the outcome to the point that he and Danny thoroughly enjoyed watching a good game together and arguing about it.

This was basically Steve's room because Danny still had his own house in Manoa. But, he was here more often than he was ever there and that was just fine with Steve. Danny liked to joke that the only time he ever saw his place anymore was as a pit stop to pick up something or go through mail when he had a chance. Really, didn't it make more sense for him to move in here, Steve wondered more and more often these days.

In his arms, Danny stilled just a little bit as he snuggled more firmly into him rubbing his nose into the soft fabric of Steve's tee shirt. It tickled him, but Steve didn't do anything more than squirm in response.

"Love...you smell nice, buddy." Danny murmured sleepily. 

"Yeah, I know. You get the good stuff for our clothes." Steve smirked to him, his voice all growly in that way that Danny once told him curled his toes.

"Worth it, right?" 

"If you keep nosing me like this, then hell, yeah, it's worth it." 

Danny's blond head came up briefly to take the kiss that Steve placed there and let his 5-0 boss nibble on his lips playfully. His heart kicked up and responded now that it had been woken up properly and his arms tightened on Steve form.

"Doc says we got wait a little more, pal." Steve grumbled as he reluctantly slowed down his machinations.

As he lay his head down against Steve's chest, Danny grinned. Steve would probably break something inside himself or worse, snap his new liver in two and ruin all of Danny's work if the stress of having to hear Danny call what he was doing fussing came into play. So instead, he thought about a new way to say it.

"When are you going to get a new hobby?" Danny grumbled. "This one's getting boring."

"Hey, you're the one who uploaded sixty percent of your liver into my body, buddy." Steve had asked a bunch of questions to the doctors and looked it all up himself to find out exactly what the hell Danny had done for him. To say he was stunned speechless was an understatement. "Therefore, I think a couple of things need to be established between us. You're my parts guy now and I have to make sure nothing happens to my parts guy." 

Danny could practically hear the smirk on Steve's good looking without seeing it.

"I'm your parts guy? What am I? Auto Zone now?" Danny quipped easily. "You want me to give you one of those cards where every fifth part is free? I sure as hell hope you don't plan on being a Frequent Flyer in this program, McGarrett." 

Steve heard no fire in Danny's words, only the grin that was forming in his attractive face, the face that knocked the wind out of Steve the first day they had met, figuratively and literally. 

"Danno, there's an old saying that clearly states and I'm quoting here, just to let you know, that if you save someone's life, you're responsible for it for life. How can you look after me if you're not well? So, I'm just getting you well, so you can get back to your responsibility, baby." 

"There's not enough hours in the day for that job, Steven, but you know I keep trying."

Steve's stomach shook with his deep but quiet laugh and he stroked Danny's skin absently with the thumb of one of his large hands.

Truth be told, Steve wasn't lying and he wasn't exaggerating. But, he wasn't talking about today. He wasn't talking about how Danny had given him a part of his own liver when Steve's had recently been all shot up in their recent undercover drug operation and certain death was waiting for him if he didn't get a new organ to replace it and almost had no time to do it. Danny had apparently been the only choice to do a live donor transplant. Their blood type matched. Their tissue type matched. No one was going to stop Danny from doing it on that day. To hear Chin tell it, Danny hadn't thought a second. Just decided that he met all the qualifications and they shouldn't waste any time and they had to just get on with it.

He couldn't help staring at the scar that was displayed on his own skin and thinking of Danny. He had other scars, other reminders of his life and how he'd lived it on military missions and his activities. But, none of them gave him the quickening of his blood the way this one did, the way this one reminded him just how connected he and Danny were now to each other. 

He had a miracle inside of him that Danny had given him. Not to get over dramatic, but it was like Danny breathed for him when couldn't do it on his own anymore.

No, he wasn't talking about Afghanistan or North Korea or that time he'd called himself Steve's personal security detail and went along with him to Cambodia or any number of times when Danny rained cover fire for his best friend while Steve did things like leap from one building to another or rush an armed suspect on one of their missions for the governor's task force here in Hawaii.

No, if Steve was talking about Danny saving Steve's life and putting himself into a place where he would potentially have to take one for him, he'd have to go all the way back to day they'd met and the bullet Danny had put into that guy Fred Doran when they'd gone to question him about Steve's father's murder and where they could find Victor Hesse.

Steve had been owing him since that day and the tab was getting higher and higher. 

He'd always been very protective of Danny. He'd always been sort of 'MINE' where he was concerned. And Steve didn't like to share, never learned how, so instead of working with the Honolulu Police Department over time to get Danny's services for his team, he'd simply taken him and made him his partner on the spot without even checking with him. Without even talking about it over beers or something or even come close to asking him, "So, you want to work with me and be on the new state task force I'm setting up for Governor, Detective Williams?" He'd blown through his arguments in seconds and then let him know he wasn't asking him and Steve's mind was already made up regarding his first hire.

Danny had been hoping mad, but they'd made it work and looking back at everything they'd gone through these last six years, Steve wouldn't even blink about doing it all again. HPD could just go and get someone else, thank you, he was keeping Danny and he sure as hell was going to treat him a hell of a lot better than they ever did anyway.

It was just that it had gotten a whole lot more complicated when they'd gotten a whole lot more personal with each other and that had happened like taking a lit match to a keg of dynamite. One night, one touch in a second of letting it happen after months and months of forcing themselves to keep away from each other and they'd been each other's after that occasion. He had to admit the attraction was always there, always just under the surface of all their bickering and arguing and getting into each other's personal spaces. They'd flirted shamelessly with each other and both had known what they were doing and where was going to go if they kept it up.

Steve's hands slid over to Danny's abdomen and very, very gently circle rubbed the area where the rest of his liver had been where before he'd given it to Steve. The first night after they'd come from the hospital the first time, Steve had found a way to arrange them on the bed so that he could kiss the place on Danny's incision over and over until he'd mewled with pleasure. It wasn't gone forever because the doctors had been very clear that both he and Danny would have their normal size organs in place within six to eight weeks after the transplant. 

Amazing, really. Danny would just grow back what he given him. Like a superhero in one of those fantastic tales. When Steve had found his voice again after he'd been told where his shiny new liver had come from, he'd been furious. Danny had no right to have himself cut up and handed out like he'd been part of some super sale at the mall! He was his best friend, damn it, he was the father of those two children who needed him around, and he was the man who Steve was in love with and planned to keep around him for the rest of his life. How dare he do this and risk blowing all of that to hell. 

"I wouldn't have let you stop me, Steve." Danny had told him quietly. "You're my responsibility, remember? And I'm not letting anything happen to my responsibility."

"You crazy son of a bitch." Steve's eyes had flashed a blue black fire that Danny had seen a few other times and one of those times had been the first time that had landed them both in Steve's bed together.

"Then, we're a perfect match, buddy." Williams reasoned for him. "See, we don't even have to use any of those dating sites. We got it right on our own."

The crooked grin he'd flashed him had seeped all the fury out of Steve and he'd just stared at him and shook his head as he lay there watching him from his hospital bed.

Danny blew it all off in terms of his own condition except to grumble over it to get under Steve's skin, but it hadn't been all funny. He'd been slower to recover than Steve had been and when Steve saw signs of that, he began to worry. And as the other members of 5-0 including and especially Danny had found out a long time ago, no one worried quite like Steve McGarrett did and to compare it to being thrown live hand grenades at intervals when the man would lose it was an understatement.

It was just that there were no act he could do, no gift he could give in return, no words he could come up with that would ever cover what Danny had just done for him and in his inability to find an appropriate equalizer, he floundered in putting together even the most basic of thoughts on what he wanted to say.

A simple, 'Hey, thanks, buddy for donating one of your organs to me so I could live. How about a beer sometime?' didn't seem to take care of it to his way of thinking. 

So, he acted like an idiot and an emotionally immature one at that and worked on Danny's last nerve instead. And bingo, we had a winner; something Steven J. McGarrett had excelled at and not since BUD/s and Hell Week with the SEALS had he performed so well. While, he basked in the unending attention that everyone basked on him, Danny was relegated to his enormous shadow and pouted his way through it.

And then as the New Jersey transplant cop had continued his recovery, it just HAD to happen. He split his stitches and fell to the floor while in the middle of reprimanding Steve for wanting to go off on one of his latest stunts to capture their latest suspect.

As Steve watched horrified, blood seeped through Danny's clothes and pooled around him dark, and angry on the ground. On his knees in an instant, all he could remember was holding onto Danny with one hand while he called 911 with the other one to get his partner back to Tripler again.

"You told me it was a doable procedure!" Steve had barked at his surgeon. "You said it was a standard procedure and Danny wasn't in any danger doing it."

The surgeon was a fully qualified and practiced physician Steve had found out after getting Jerry to do a full and precise background check for him that included even things like what the man ate for breakfast because no way in hell had he better find out that anyone not qualified was talking Danny into giving out parts of himself even if it was for Steve.

Chin and Grover had tried to hold him back but Steve had gotten right into the doctor's face as he continued to glare at him. Abby and Kono were trying to find out how long they'd have to wait before any more information could be given on Danny's condition.

The doctor looked nervously at Steve, but cleared his throat and explained that the transplant procedure that was done went as expected and was successful.

"Then, why isn't Danny getting better as fast as I am and why the hell was he bleeding all over the place and I had to get him in here completely unconscious?"

Steve's tone was excited and angry, something that happened whenever he felt Danny threatened in any way and his teammates all recognized it. Even Abby, new as she was, started to get that intuition thing where Steve and Danny were concerned and when one of them was getting ready to go off because of the other man.

"We're taking very good care of Detective Williams, ma'am." the nurse behind the desk assured Abby and the inspector from San Francisco had only nodded in answer.

"Tell me what's wrong with my partner." Steve insisted as the doctor took a deep breath. 

"Detective Williams is recovering from the transplant surgery and I expect him to make a full recovery as I do you, Commander McGarrett. However, his stitches ruptured due to excess exertion and that's where all the blood is coming from, that's what you were seeing. He's bleeding internally. You got him here in time. We have him in theatre and we're working to repair the stitches."

"You have to go back in and open him up again." Steve had just nodded his head, his mind reeling as the events of this whole mess started to unravel and tumble around for him. He'd been unconscious the last time and Danny had made all the decisions. Everyone else had gone along with it. 

Wiping both his hands down his face, he looked around at the others and then shook his head. Anger hadn't been alone in his thoughts. There was a more than a fair amount of guilt mixed with all of it. Thoughts of Danny's young daughter and newly found son and all the time helping Steve may have robbed them.

"Shit!" he swore at himself. The man he loved who had helped him so many times was now in danger for his own life because of him. What the hell was he going to tell Grace and Charlie? He'd seen the looks on their faces as they'd come in to see them with the others during the visiting hours. He'd seen how how happy they were knowing their dad was alright. How was he going to walk out of here if not with Danny?

Steve had stayed in a somewhat altered frozen state as the team all waited out the procedure and then, he pretty much camped out in a very uncomfortable chair next to Danny's hospital bed.

The others had urged Steve to go home and get back to his own recovery. None of them had any trouble taking his place to be there for Danny, but Steve had refused.

"I'm not leaving him." he quietly shook his head. "I want to be here when he wakes up and we'll leave together when he's ready to go home with me." There is no more 'my life' without Danny anymore for me, he added silently.

Chin had sworn that pure steel made up Steve's spine. There was no getting around him when he made up his mind. So, in a compromise of sorts, they moved Danny to another room with a second bed for Steve like the one they shared when they'd been in there for the transplant.

"You waited for me to wake up? The whole time?" Danny had asked him groggily when he'd woken up.

"Yeah, well, you've done your share of time waiting on me to wake up, right?" Steve had shrugged, his face barely able to conceal how relieved he was that Danny had opened his eyes.

"Your brain is wearing me out." Danny now grumbled from his place in Steve's arms. "Stop thinking so much."

"Wow. There's something I don't hear from you every day. Usually, I'm accused of not doing that from you, Danno." He eyed the television again as he watched the quick skating the players were doing keeping after the puck in play.

"Well, usually, because those times always involved you doing those crazy moves of yours like things that were practically guaranteed to have a hell of a good chance at getting us killed. This time, this time, you're just making me dizzy." 

The blond nudged himself closer to the Naval officer, his body next to him fitting quite easily.

"I split my stitches, Steve, okay? No fun, I agree and it hurt like like nobody's business, I'm not going to lie to you. Unplanned, but those doctors at Tripler know their shit, okay? Took good care of me." 

"Yeah, no thanks to you."

"What?"

"What do you mean, what? You shouldn't have been up and around yelling at me. You should have been in bed resting and getting better."

"Okay, if you'll recall, I was up and around yelling at you, Steve, because you were planning on another one of your brilliant moves to get our target while your body was still recovering from a transplant operation- remember what I told you about taking care of my liver? Well, leaping from buildings isn't part of that program yet. We decided that Chin, Kono, Lou, and Abby were going to handle this one while we got better. I distinctly remember me telling you this and you agreeing to agree with me. I was there. I heard me say it."l

"I was getting better." Steve insisted, mulish.

"You stupid idiot, will you please help me out here? I happen to care what happens to you."

"Why can't you understand that I care about what happens to you, too?" McGarrett wanted to know. " The day I met you, I said you were the back up. I didn't know then that I really meant that...or maybe I did and that's why I picked you. And I can't give you back enough for what you gave me, Danny."

The last part was spoken so quietly, so softly that Williams had to strain to hear it and it was one of those where you wonder if you had actually heard it.

Danny had come to accept that Steve wasn't the type of person to express himself in any actual way to let anyone know his feelings. It wasn't that Danny was unaware of his friend's thoughts. His actions spoke of the fact that he was aware that he had lost one of his organs and now he had a new one. Maybe that was enough.

But, this, this he didn't expect and he was momentarily too caught off guard to make a comeback of any kind.

I didn't do it to get...anything. Our undercover op? Straight to hell, buddy and you right along with it. I was running on fumes up there." Danny assured him quietly but firmly. "I... ah, look you needed it, Steve, okay? You needed it and I had it and we were not good for time, you understand me? I knew two things; I had to land that plane and get you to the hospital and do whatever it took. I didn't have to take any test, I knew we matched blood types. They cross checked the tissue type for the liver and we were good to go. My son needed my bone marrow, I gave it to him." He shrugged. "Same type of situation, Steve."

"Charlie's a little boy, Danny. He didn't have time to wait. He's your son. I am..."

"The man I love, Steve." he finished for him. "Not my child, no. It's not like that. But, you are in my life and as crazy as you drive me on a regular basis, I would prefer that you stayed there. I'd rather not have to break in somebody new after going through ten rounds with you these last years."

Danny wouldn't be able to see it because he couldn't see Steve's face since he wasn't looking at him from his position, Steve knew. He couldn't see how his eyes drew together with more than a little touch of jealousy that he couldn't help at the thought of Danny seeing anyone else other than him.

" But, even if we weren't together, even if we weren't, I would still have done this because..." his partner continued on to him.

He didn't finish. After all this time and everything they'd been through together, he didn't think he had to say anything. It wasn't classified. Steve could figure it out. 

"I could have..." Steve started to tell him no matter how ridiculous it might sound.

"A few hours. Maybe. You needed this bad. You didn't see yourself in that plane up there with me when we were going down. I did. I was there." Danny nodded lying against the other man's tall frame, his mind going back and mentally shuddering at the images of Steve lying unconscious in the seat next to him, blood pouring out of his body and onto the floor. "Your liver was basically out, Steve, okay? Listen to me." 

"I wasn't going to go home without you that day. I spent too much of me in this between us, you know. I put in a lot of time here. My kids are crazy about you. I wasn't going to go home and tell them their Uncle Steve wasn't coming back. I wasn't going to put the pressure of that on them."

"What are you talking about?" Steve's voice was gruff, but still soft.

"I wasn't going to dump the responsibility of having to pick me up when I lost my mind if anything happened to you on the two of them." Danny took a deep breath as his words hung in the air between them.

"Given that, a part of my liver was very much a small sacrifice for me if it meant I get to keep you McGarrett. So, there you go. Because as crazy as you get me and as much and as frustrated as I get with you, you are my sanity and let me just be perfectly clear in case you missed it. I am in love with you. You didn't ask me to date you thinking there was going to be some good times and sex and that was it and I wasn't going to react to anything that happened to you or God forbid put you at risk for being taken away from me, did you? Because if that's the case, we need to sit down and discuss what a relationship is right now, Steven and please be prepared to take notes here."

His mouth quirked up at the corner as he added,the warmth of Steve's skin seeping into him. "There is another positive here that you may have missed. With even just that much of me inside of you, maybe it give me a little influence over you and you might just start to think before leaping into the fire when we're out there hunting down Hawaii's most wanted."

"Get it out of the gutter, babe. I was talking about my liver inside of you." Danny crackled and Steve laughed outright at that and the two of them tried to catch their breaths after a few moments. 

He thought a minute and then decided, "Ah, who the hell am I kidding. It's going to take a hell of lot more than just a little bit of my liver to get you to change on that, isn't it?"

"You'd be bored if I changed." Steve said with a small grin, his heartbeat racing through him. The little laugh that was patent Steve made itself known again.

"Boredom is under appreciated, my friend." Danny turned his head just a fraction enough to brush a kiss across Steve's stomach. He felt it quiver underneath him, felt Steve's excitement get more and more in seconds. 

"Did you take your pills?" he asked him curiously as he felt the rise and fall of Steve's chest under him. Since his operation, the doctors had put him on a daily regimen of anti rejection meds so his body wouldn't reject the transplant. It was a lifetime commitment and Danny had never been so grateful to have it.

"Yeah." Steve confirmed quietly. He wasn't thrilled that this was something he'd have to do now. But, he was here holding the man he loved. He was living his life and doing his job and being around his friends still. And every time he saw Danny smile or hear one of his rants or when they were fully recovered again and able to make love fully like before, he knew he'd never complain about having to take medication every day to keep all of that going on, so what the hell? It was a pill, right?

He snuggled further into Danny's side again and the thought of never having this, never having Steve again filled Danny with panic. This was theirs and what they had together was good. 

Maybe a little later, the two of them could put together a light meal and have it out on the lanai and watch the sunset. Then, they could go inside and watch a little TV if they could stop fighting over what to watch long enough to actually pick something. Steve had mentioned some movie he was curious about and Danny had no doubt it probably involved a lot of action and wild stunts and McGarrett would thoroughly enjoy it. It would be like watching himself.

Right now, with the game still continuing on the TV in front of them, the breeze blowing in through the open French doors that led out to the upstairs deck, the sheets soft and Steve snuggled next to him, this was exactly where Danny wanted to be and Danny said a silent thought to whatever good luck had come his way to give him the chance to have it....still have it.


End file.
